


Maze rat

by ThePiningTrees



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Bootcamp, Dehumanization, Drabbles, Inspired by Black Mirror, M/M, Psychological Torture, Slow Burn, Underdog!Stiles, Unethical Experimentation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-15
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-25 05:06:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21810535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePiningTrees/pseuds/ThePiningTrees
Summary: Peter studies the monitors. The process of the rat’s  advancement through the tunnels nicknamed ‘the sewers’, simply because it resemblances an intricate, man-sized sewer-system, is established by a timer and a variety of indexes on-screen, such as the recruit’s speed, chosen path, and number of checkpoints he manages to cross off.
Relationships: Peter Hale & Stiles Stilinski, Peter Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Kudos: 15





	Maze rat

**Author's Note:**

> I won't be posting regularly, but it would be fun to have a dark Black Mirroresque fic to add to once in a while. Peter will be an anti-hero, in this case.

_Three steps forward. Turn 45 degrees. Step back. Sit_.

Is he sitting? The resistance against his ass gives him the necessary sensory information: hard surface, damp and cool from the temperature in the room.

The last command has immobilized him but after thirty seconds the bare heels of his feet leaves the floor when the muscles in his chins constricts. He vibrates impatiently in place. His stomach surges. He feels pressure against his bladder, but he can’t be sure if he has to pee or if it’s mostly nerves.

His legs jiggle so much his breath is affected by the vibrations. Air comes out of his mouth in quick _huff, huff, huffs._ He keeps creating the sounds to distract himself; to prevent him from going nuts. The room has no light source – it’s too dark to evaluate the size of it. Impossible to make out corners. Not much to rely on now – sensory deprivation. He’s heard of it.

 _Now_ , the distant voice in the intercom says.

Stiles instinctively lifts his head to find the source, in time to be blinded by a siren lightning up and casting the room in rapid-rythm flashes of blue and white light. Stiles whips his head side to side to register as much as he can before the siren shuts off. Darkness pushes against his retinas once more.

He hadn’t been thinking about his actions at the time, but now he’s aware that’s he’s standing, with his arms held a few inches from his sides to keep his balance when he crosses the floor blind. Five steps forward (damn, the room’s small) and his fumbling hand curls around a cylinder-shaped object. Further investigation reveals several bars parallel to each other, continuing up, up until he can’t reach them. He puts his foot on the lowest bar and mounts.

He bumbs his head in a ceiling. His hands skim the surface of the wall, searching for irregularities. As soon as he finds what could be a button, he pushes his finger in. A sound of a big object being removed: another wall must have opened up for him. The siren flashes white, once, and dies before he has a chance to turn his head in the right direction. He drops down to the ground, letting his knees absorb the fall.

The sound came from his left, opposite of the wall with the siren. He walks blindly to examine the wall, which doesn’t feel like a wall to him. His skimming hands find the edges of two shelves. The space he mistook for a wall has three stories in total. He extends his arm inside but finds to resistance. If he’s lucky he has three exits he’ll be able to crawl through. He has to decide which of the three he wants to try though: the bottom, the middle, or the top. Shrugging – there’s no time to contemplate – he cups his genitalia for protection, picks up a knee and crawls on top of the first shelf. As he suspected from sticking his arm in, it appears to be some kind of tunnel. He crawls forward on his elbows and knees, meets a wall barely ten foot in, and turns right, following the wall on his left hand. The crawl-space is narrowing in his mind – some old, evolutionary fear of being trapped in a hole underground, deprived of oxygen.

An alarm goes off at deafening decibels: It demands to be turned off by him; won’t shut off until he’s the one to find the off-switch. He sticks his fingers in his ears and tries to _think_.

**

“How is he doing?”

“He’s in the sewers.”

Peter studies the monitors. The process of the rat’s advancement through the tunnels nicknamed ‘the sewers’, simply because it resemblances an intricate, man-sized sewer-system, is established by a timer and a variety of indexes on-screen, such as the recruit’s speed, chosen path, and number of checkpoints he manages to cross off. The inhabitants of the sewers were fittingly referred to as ‘rats’. From the looks of it, the aforementioned rat on the heat-camera is in a fetus position clutching its head.

“Twenty seconds – he’s behind,” the controller says. “Went through the wrong pipe.”

Peter huffs out his impatience. “Flush him.”

“Sir? He hasn’t hit the sixty second mark.”

“It needs a motivator, Chib. I’ll allow it.”

**

Stiles hears the sloshing water enter the pipes several feet above and to his left – it sounds like water traveling through a pipe when someone flushes the toilet. He registers it all: the time it takes for the water to reach his part of the tunnel, the velocity of how it slams his body against the far wall, near the entrance. The water tastes foul and he spits it out, tries to sneeze to sooth the burn in his nostrils. He crawls back through the trickling stream, shivering with anger.

He finds the opening in the ceiling where the water came from and crawls through. He feels a moment of relief when he’s able to stretch his legs, but he hits the ceiling before he’s able to straighten his neck. He scoots over the ledge to another tunnel, and continues crawling on elbows and knees. The claustrophobia returns when he hits a dead end moments after.

”Shit.”

He scoots backwards, drops down. Start over. The alarm blares; rocks his eardrums. He fumbles in the dark; searches the walls and the corners of the tunnel, finds bolts in the ceiling; edges where the walls has been welded together. There’s no buttons. He retreats to where he started. One option down. He climbs out and enters the tunnel adjacent to the floor, not bothering to catch his breath.

Contrary to the L-shaped middle-level tunnel, this one continues on in different directions, resembling a maze. He bends in half as he takes left run after left turn. His knees are chafing. His elbows hit the walls. His mouth opens to elicit another complaint right when the second flood hits him.

**

Peter comes back from his lunch-break with coffee in hand.

”Progress report?”

The controller sits up in his chair; tries to dispose of the magazine in his lap without drawing his superior’s attention. He moves the window of the live-feed to the big screen and enhances it. The heat-cam isn’t needed in this part of the maze. The sewer-system is lit up in a bright, white light. Peter studies the image of the soaked rat squeezing his body through one of the narrower, final tunnels. He’s inches from victory and probably has no idea.

”Ah.” Chib gestures nervously at the monitor. ”He really picked up the pace.”

”Took him an hour.” Peter sips his coffee to prevent himself from reprimanding Chib. The rat could’ve drowned ten times over under the controller’s negligence. What holds him back is the knowledge of his own absence. ”Send me the recording when he’s out. What’s his score?”

Chib enhances the score-board. He whistles under his breath.

It’s a good score. Peter tilts his head: observes the rat closely for the first time. It looks anemic and it’s panting, but there’s fight left, judging by how it’s face screws up in frustration for every inch it covers. Peter can’t believe it’s still moving.

“Flush him again. Make him work for it.”

Chib taps the command on the keyboard.

The rat scratches the wall as it’s helplessly flushed through several pipes, effectively ruining what must have been a particularly strenuous climb. It stays motionless in a heap on the ground. Peter walks closer to the monitor, patiently waiting for it to show signs of life. It either unconscious or the mishap proved to be too much to handle.

“The ground level, is it flooded?”

Chib views the maze from another camera. “As seen, it’s an aquarium now. Rat held his breath for nearly five minutes before he found his way.”

“He’s exhausted.” Peter considers the options. “How did he fare?”

“I thought he’d drowned. I activated the pumps and he was lying there like a fish on dry land.”

The rat starts to show signs of recovering. His feeble, bleeding fingers searches the tunnel trapping him, lingering deliberately over the walls and corners, examining them closely before he’s made up his mind.

Peter hums. “He catalogues where he’s been. Our little maze rat.”


End file.
